Study: Antipsychotics Again Found Deadly For Dementia, Alzheimer's

A new study is out in Lancet Neurology asserting that antipsychotics used to treat Alheimer's and dementia in the elderly may double the risk of death in patients. Use of these drugs in treating the elderly is off-label, but is nonetheless a huge proportion of antipsychotic sales, especially in the US, and has led to numerous lawsuits.

In the study, researchers found that of 83 patients receiving antipsychotics, 39 were dead within one year, while of 82 receiving placebo, 27 were dead within one year. And:

"After two years, 46 percent of Alzheimer's patients taking the anti-psychotics were alive, versus 71 percent of those not on the drugs. After three years, only 30 percent of patients on the drugs were alive, versus 59 percent of those not taking drugs."

That's pretty startling and so was the assessment of one of the study authors:

"'For the vast majority of Alzheimer's patients, taking these drugs is probably not a worthwhile risk,' said Clive Ballard, the paper's lead author, of the Wolfson Centre for Age-Related Diseases at King's College London.

"'Would I want to take a drug that slightly reduced my aggression but doubled my risk of dying? I'm not sure I would,' Ballard said."

This kind of evidence lines up with other recent studies and assessments of antipsychotics use in the elderly, including studies finding that treating patients with placebo was more effective than with an antipsychotic and studies showing an increased risk of stroke on these drugs.

Simply put, these drugs should be used very little in the elderly, if at all. Sadly, there's evidence that, at least in Canada, doctors are ignoring the various black box warnings on these drugs.